


Vampire Hunter of Noreah

by razielim



Series: Merry Smutmas 2018 [7]
Category: Original Work
Genre: Disguise, Drunk Sex, Dubious Consent, M/M, Mild Blood, Pleasurable Vampire Bites
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-25
Updated: 2018-12-25
Packaged: 2019-09-14 10:25:42
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,589
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16911207
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/razielim/pseuds/razielim
Summary: A vampire hunter walks into a bar. When a handsome stranger strikes up a conversation about the upcoming campaign of the neighboring nation to wipe out the vampire city, who is Kenneth to resist a little geopolitical-supernatural chatter? And if one thing leads to another in this otherwise rather backwards and uneventful village, well…





	Vampire Hunter of Noreah

Kenneth stomped his feet hard on the floorboards of the threshold, leaden legs thrumming at the impact. Heavy sloughs of snow crumbled from his boots with every strike.

Another violent gust of the permastorm pushed Kenneth to almost slip and fall in the wet entryway, and he shouldered the door firmly shut before the weather could rage its way any further into the building. Loud protests at the cold draft shouted over the cheers of welcome from all corners of the packed alehouse. Kenneth waved a greeting to the room at large before striking at the snow still plastered to the sides of his boots. It came off in brilliantly sparkling sprays of dry powder.

Finally satisfied that he’d left most of the snow behind on the rush mat in the recessed floor of the entrance, Kenneth looked up at the smiling innkeeper and grinned, pulling down his scarf to breathe dry, warm air for the first time in weeks.

He sagged at the simple pleasure.

Natka the serving girl came up, and he passed his gloves and hat to her. Fingers still creaking, he struggled a long time with unbuttoning his coat, finally draping it over Natka’s waiting arms. Unstrapping the weapons and supplies that hung over his wool dress, he allowed the ale master’s son to take those from him as well. Airing out his long skirts as he went, he finally approached the bar and dropped heavily into the seat where a large ale and the master of the establishment were waiting for him.

Kenneth disappeared in the ale for a good long while, grunting appreciatively at the warm, velvety texture. When he’d finished the mug, Grett the alemaster was holding up a jug of compote and waving it enticingly. Kenneth spread his elbows out comfortably and waved an encouraging hand.

“Go on, then. Let’s see what bizarre combination you’ve brewed up this time,” he said, waving a greeting to Grett’s wife as she sat a basket of bread, cheese, and sausage before him. Kenneth laid siege to the food, and Grett poured a healthy helping of compote into Kenneth’s mug, topping it off with more ale. Chasing a bit of sausage and mustard with the mixture, Kenneth moaned. “Your best yet, Alemaster. Best yet.”

Grett had only started telling him all the news since he’d last passed through this village when the stew came out. Not quite done inhaling the food already in front of him, Kenneth pulled this bowl close as well and was about to set into it when he took a quick glance around the bar and stopped short.

The man sitting a few paces to his left stood out so obviously that Kenneth could have kicked himself for not seeing him sooner. There wasn’t anyone with hair darker than a dirty blonde for leagues, and he’d somehow managed to sit right next to a man with hair black as ink for several long minutes without noticing.

“Who’s this, then? A visitor?” he asked Grett, drawing the man’s attention. The stranger’s brows and lashes were equally black, which inflated Kenneth’s curiosity further. “Is that really all natural?”

The man gave Kenneth a subdued smile.

“Finally have eyes for something other than food, eh?” Grett said, cackling. “This is Marr. He’s here from Moera, the coast, trading medicines and spices. Some of the latter are already in that stew you were about to stuff yourself with. Poor lad’s been freezing to death in our weather. Barely thawed him out when he first arrived.”

Marr’s smile had frozen, eyes fixed on a fresh blood stain on Kenneth’s cuff. Kenneth pushed up his sleeves, and their eyes met.

“And this is Kenneth, though you’ll hear people around town call him Master Hunter. As you might guess from the title, he’s our vampire hunter.”

“Vampire?” Marr repeated, stirring and looking at Grett. “I thought that was a coastal problem. Thought they couldn’t survive the snow.” He glanced with more alarm at Kenneth’s cuff.

Grett grunted. “They survive it about as well as humans do. Used to come up regularly and pick people off who stayed out too late in the permastorm. Then twelve years ago a whole drove of them attacked a village not far from here. Drained everyone. My uncle’s whole side of the family died there. Even the small children. Didn’t know what else to do, so we sent a message along to Noreah, asking for protection. And they sent Kenneth. Vampires ain’t been a problem since.”

Kenneth had remembered that he was still hungry and busied himself drowning in the stew. He gave Marr an affirmative sign at the man’s questioning gaze and kept eating.

Marr sputtered. “One man holding back all the vampires?”

“Whoa, whoa, hold it,” Kenneth said, choking and coughing to clear his throat. “It’s not like they send whole armies up here. I don’t think vampires would come up here at all if they could help it. They actually handle the cold somewhat _worse_ than humans. I reckon it’s just that they had to brave hunters if they headed east to the coast, but only the permastorm if they came here, so some of them figured snow sounded like the easier foe.”

“Ah. And now that there’s a hunter here too…”

“I don’t know if they actually _know_ there’s a hunter here,” Kenneth said, frowning. “I don’t think I’ve left any alive to tell the tale. But it’s hard to tell in the storm. Sometimes it gets so bad that someone can be standing ten feet from you and you’d never know. Either way, they’ve surely noticed by now that whosoever comes north has a low chance of survival.”

Marr nodded. “You know, on the coast, they’re talking about raising the Hunter Militia to its largest size yet and _marching_ on the vampires. Wipe them out once and for all. We lose too many innocent lives to that menace and the new governor dreams of ushering in a new era of security.”

Kenneth whistled. “How large is the vampire nest?”

“Nest?” Marr lowered his voice. “It’s a city. There’s thousands of them there. Perhaps hundreds of thousands. They occupy all of the ruins of Old Dannal. Why do you think the plague of their existence never dwindles?”

“Hold on now,” Grett cut in, pouring more compote and ale for Kenneth, “if there’s so many of them, how do they find enough food? They’re barely getting one or two souls in the north every year, the coast’s got legions of hunters, where are they getting blood from?”

“That’s the great question, isn’t it?” Marr said, drinking from his own mug. “They have humans there, certainly. But no one knows how those humans got there.”

Grett and Kenneth exchanged looks. This was a troubling revelation. The City of Noreah was too far, too uninvested to send enough Sheriffs so far south into the permastorm if the vampires ever invaded in large numbers. And even if they did send help, it would take a long time to arrive. This village and all those nearby would be wiped off the map. Marr seemed to be thinking along the same lines.

“Do you think the North would help?” he asked. “If there was a large advance on the vampire city? Would, er, Noreah send troops?”

Grett looked to Kenneth, shifting uncomfortably, but Kenneth only shook his head. “No chance. Noreah’s Sheriffs exist to keep peace and maintain laws. Individuals who were particularly inspired might volunteer, but that’s as much help as would come.”

“But surely they care about protecting humans from —”

“Protecting humans?” Kenneth interrupted. “I’m not saying I’m not sympathetic, Marr, but that’s a very coastal perspective. The people who live in the villages _here_ might echo the sentiment. But the other side of the Great Range, the humans’ greatest enemy is other humans. No one there’s so much as _seen_ a vampire, why should they care if they’re off causing trouble for someone else?”

“But they sent _you_ here,” Marr tried, looking hurt.

“Ah,” Grett answered, taking Marr’s mug to top it off, “that they don’t. They sent him _the one time_.”

Marr blinked and turned back to Kenneth.

Kenneth shrugged one shoulder noncommittally. “It was a perfunctory gesture, after half our bigwigs had shouted themselves hoarse debating it. In the end, the decision was that _if_ anyone would volunteer for the task, _then_ they would send help. Here I am. And here I’ve been returning now and then between assignments ever since.”

“You’re not even here on permanent assignment?” Marr asked incredulously. “What happens if a vampire comes when you’re not here? What happens if _multiple_ vampires come? What if you’re here and _outnumbered?_ ”

Kenneth gave a noncommittal grunt and pushed aside his empty bowl, sharing a wry smile with Grett at the last question.

The silence dragged out.

Marr looked between them in confusion, drawing their attention. “I don’t understand.”

“Oh!” Grett jerked a little in surprise, then leaned conspiratorially towards Marr to explain. “Noreah Sheriffs don’t worry about little things like being outnumbered.”

“And about not being in the right place at the right time?”

Grett sighed. “Well, we just hope the vampires won’t have any reason to change their behavior. Besides, he’s just one man. He can only guard one village at a time as it is, even if he doesn’t go all the way back to Noreah for most of the year.”

“So you’re still making it sound like one man is enough to defend this entire village if he happened to already be here,” Marr said, rubbing the bridge of his nose like he was nursing a headache.

“Put it this way,” Kenneth said, finally taking pity on the foreigner’s ignorance, “I’ve fought off multiple vampires before. In the permastorm, it’s the same as fighting multiple humans. And if by some unlucky chance I _did_ get killed… Well. Your Moeran governor’s army would be in luck. Half of Noreah would travel south, out for blood, happy to burn the vampire city to ash.”

“Killing a Sheriff is a capital crime,” Grett explained. “Murder someone, get mixed up in slavery, there’s _one_ Sheriff that comes sniffing around. Kill a Sheriff? You trigger a holy war.”

Kenneth laughed. “People that _find_ a dead Sheriff go out of their way to prove they only found them that way. Last time it happened, the merchant that found the body in the permastorm hired three undertakers and a blacksmith to prove that none of the wounds on the body were from weapons and there wasn’t any poison in the system. It was evident enough to us just by looking that poor Freid had been _savaged by wolves_ , but the man insisted that he be given a chance to prove himself innocent.”

“It sounds to me,” Marr said, his lips curling, “like that merchant wasn’t entirely innocent.”

“Oh ho! Not to worry! That’s how we read the situation as well,” Kenneth said, suddenly clapping Marr on the shoulder and moving his stool closer. “Turns out he had a bit of a smuggling operation in the area and was afraid that our investigation into Freid’s death would uncover it. Good instinct, Marr. Perhaps _you’d_ make a good Sheriff.” He winked and nudged Marr’s elbow with his own.

Grett had other customers to see to, but he seemed as determined as ever to get Kenneth too drunk to stand after his long journey. As Kenneth got into asking Marr the details of the coast’s assault on the vampire city, Grett started pouring them his “fortified mead” which Kenneth always thought of more as spirits somewhat sweetened with mead.

After a long sober trek through the wilderness, his head started swimming two sips in.

“So, you’re telling me,” he asked Marr, imagining the logistics, “that people actually want to _live_ in the Poison Marshes?”

Marr made a disgusted noise. “For some, it’s the primary motivation of the assault. They want to ‘reclaim the homeland’ and seem to think that if they settle Old Dannal, that they’ll be able to purge the sickness with magic.”

“The amount of food that would have to be regularly transported there… And I’ve _been_ to the edges of the Poison Marshes,” Kenneth continued, getting wound up. “The poison _itself_ is made of magic; you’d have to be an idiot to mess with that if you don’t know with certainty —”

“The poison is made of magic?” Marr said suddenly, moving closer and gripping Kenneth’s arm. “What the _hell_ does that mean?”

Kenneth groaned, rubbing his face. “Well, what do people _think_ the Poison Marshes are where you’re from?”

Marr’s mouth opened and closed, his fingers tight around Kenneth’s bicep. “It’s… it’s the vampires, isn’t it? They leach the land of all goodness?”

Kenneth grunted and sipped his mead.

“Well?” Marr pressed. “What do you know about it?”

“I don’t know much,” Kenneth said, surrendering to the headache this topic always gave him. “I _do_ know that that whole land is saturated with magic. When you walk out of the permastorm and into the plains, and you start seeing that infamous red mist creeping up from the moors, that’s not water vapor, that’s _magic_.

“It’s so concentrated in the ground there that it leaks into the air and hangs above it in toxic clouds. And when the vampires come up north from the Poison Marshes, they bring that magic with them, carrying it in their very bodies for _days_ until it all leaks out. A vampire is obvious when he’s fresh from the Poison Marshes. Not so much if he’s been wandering the permastorm for weeks. If the vampires _caused_ the poison, that wouldn’t happen.”

Marr was staring at him like he’d just been hit between then eyes. He stuttered a few times, words failing him, finally taking a sip of his mead and muttering, “Sorry, I feel like you’ve uppended my whole world.”

Kenneth smiled wryly and opened his mouth to change the subject, but Marr recovered and seized upon him.

“I’m sorry, are you saying that it’s just a _coincidence_ that the vampires live in the Poison Marshes?”

“Er, no. I don’t know why they live there. Never talked to one long enough to find out. But they seem to be the only ones _able_ to live there for very long. I…” he trailed off, took a sip to fortify himself, and then barreled forward. “I realize you might not like this theory — you have every right to hate vampires — but I have long suspected that it’s the _Poison Marshes_ that cause _vampires_ , not the other way around.”

“Explain,” Marr breathed, not looking upset in the slightest.

“Err…” Kenneth scratched his stubble, unused to people being interested in his theories. Most villagers in these southern regions resented the very notion, and most of Noreah’s denizens were quite bored now of Kenneth’s conspiracy ramblings. “How to put it… Magic invariably has physical effects despite being intangible. Bringing a lot of it into your body will change your body. That’s how it’s used to heal. That’s how it’s used to grow. The vampires I’ve encountered, full to the brim with magic, what exactly has that magic been doing in their bodies? What damage has it wrought?”

“But that’s the thing, isn’t it?” Marr asked, looking too excited to breathe. “Magic is beneficent. Why would it damage some and poison others?”

“That’s exactly my point, Marr,” Kenneth told him conspiratorially. “The stuff that’s in the marshes is _nothing_ like the magic people use for healings. If it’s killing all the grass and the trees, turning out mutant animals, then there’s something fundamentally wrong with it. So the question is — what _exactly_ does it do to humans that try to live there, growing saturated with it for years, for decades? Oh, heaven forbid you try to _do_ magic there, channel all that poison right through yourself on purpose. My guess is you’d become vampire within a fortnight doing something so stupid.”

Marr sat dumbfounded again, staring into his mead.

“Listen, sorry to let you stew on it,” Kenneth said, “but I need to go take a leak.”

Marr nodded numbly, and Kenneth slipped off his stool, swaying liberally on his way to the back of the building. More drunk than he thought, he had to lean his head against the wall as he unloaded into the tilted trough. Old curiosities resurfaced, swirling through his unorganized recollection of Marr’s questions. He tried to dust off old fantasies about the fate of Old Dannal, but even this stream of thoughts was inarticulate.

Typical, he mused. You stand up and immediately become a mess.

He made his way back very carefully, smiling for no particular reason and trying to do his best to stay upright. Grett came up as he sat down next to Marr again.

“Vanquished by the mead yet again, Kenneth!” the alemaster joked, slapping the bar.

“Not quite yet,” Kenneth protested, laughing and passing his glass to be refilled. “Though I will take some stew if there’s any left. And maybe head up after.”

“I’ll have Natka prepare your room once she’s —” Grett froze and grew unusually pale.

Alert immediately for danger, Kenneth glanced around the room, palm finding the hilt of his dagger in its thigh holster.

“Grett?”

“A dozen apologies, Sheriff Kenneth!” Grett stuttered, wringing his wool apron in his hands. “I hadn’t thought to expect you! The meat traders are in town and I put them up, and then Marr here arrived unexpectedly out of the permastorm, and I gave him my last room. Please, if you will, I’ll have my wife tidy our own bedroom, or if you prefer, I’ll give —”

Kenneth, who was trying to wave away Grett’s offers, finally interrupted. “Grett, I don’t want any of those things. Give me a warm blanket and a spot by the fire and I’m happy.”

Grett started to protest, but Marr spoke louder than him. “Plenty of space in the room I’m staying in. Even the bed’s large enough to comfortably fit two men.”

Kennet grinned. “And what, drunkenly giggle at each other half the night? You’ll regret that offer.”

Marr only laughed and put an arm around Kenneth. “It’ll be like reliving adolescence — too young and unskilled to afford our own rooms, piling four to a bed with a bunch of strangers.”

“Drunkenly elbowing all three bedfellows on the way out of bed to piss,” Kenneth said, getting caught up in the reminiscing. “I think I’ll take you up on it. But only if there’s adolescent giggling involved. — No, Grett, I’ll hear no more on the subject. You don’t take coin from me as it is.”

As Grett rushed to the kitchen for more food by way of expressing apology, Marr leaned in, eyes darting around for evesdroppers, and quickly whispered, “Giggling isn’t the only adolescent thing two men can do in bed.”

Kenneth tensed, suddenly broken from his joyful mood, and cautiously glanced around as well.

He scratched at his cheek, faintly feeling a blush rise to his liquor-numb skin. He met Marr’s gaze and held it, studying his own reflection in Marr’s impossibly inky eyes. Anyone could get lost in those depths. The rest of Marr’s face too, was like a sculpture of Dannal royalty, tapered, without any harsh angles, and unmarred by burst veins and frostbite scars. Good breeding and good climate, Kenneth thought. Despite the handsome features, however, the local weather seemed to not agree with Marr, and his skin was such a sickly pale that Kenneth hadn’t even thought to take a second look until now. His long black hair, rather than being lustrous in the firelight, was strangely matte, adding to the unsettling sickly feeling.

Grett came back with more stew, more bread, more cheese and sausage, and Kenneth realized he hadn’t done anything but stared.

He cleared his throat, slipping his hand over Marr’s thigh under the counter and squeezing as he reached for his mead. Damn his tendency to pick out flaws. Marr was the single most attractive man he’d seen in nine years, and he’d be happy to see where things went if he didn’t manage to fumble the chance first.

He turned to Grett as the man poured him more mead and more compote ale, laughing and trying to stop him, and when he failed to do so, he announced, “Grett, I think we’re taking this party upstairs. Else I’ll be too drunk to make it up there later.”

Grett took it as an opportunity to fetch more food and drink.

They were escorted upstairs by Grett, his wife, his son, and Natka, all carrying pitchers and plates and baskets. Tender slices of smoked root vegetables and sticky sap desserts had been added to their makeshift feast, making it a whole spread. Then he and Marr were finally left alone in the bedroom, enough food and drink on the table between their armchairs to last them two days.

Marr gawked. “Are they always this hospitable?”

“To me?” Kenneth said, “Always. It’s like they’re trying to shake me down for all I’m worth, except that Grett never accepts my gold. I have to sneak gratuity into the house purse when he’s not around.”

“Because you hunt vampires for them?”

“Because I do it for free,” Kenneth agreed.

“How much does it normally cost?” Marr asked, reaching for some of the smoked roots. “What are the fees for hiring a Noreah sheriff?”

“Paying your taxes,” Kenneth said, kicking his feet up. “Ironically, this region doesn’t traditionally pay taxes to Noreah. No one can be bothered to come collect. That was part of the problem with sending anyone down to help when that massacre happened.”

“Traditionally?”

Kenneth shrugged. “The villages try to pay me for my services. But I take my salary from the City of Noreah. Any payment I receive, I bring back. As far as the bookkeepers are concerned, this region has been paying an unofficial tax of humble sums the last twelve years or so. Keeps my superiors off my case for disappearing for weeks and months at a time.”

“Sheriff, vampire hunter, tax collector,” Marr said into his mead glass. “How _does_ he do it all?”

Kenneth threw a half-eaten breadcrust at him.

A long silence opened up between them, Kenneth feeding his drunk appetite and Marr delicately nibbling on a piece of cheese. Kenneth wondered how to broach the subject of Marr’s earlier invitation. Or whether he should broach it at all until he was too full to eat another bite. He was just trying to decide it if was worth drinking more alcohol when Marr spoke.

“So _you_ don’t think the vampires are evil?” he asked, accusation clear in his voice.

With that, Kenneth made up his mind and reached for his glass of mead. “A bunch of them wiped a village off the map. That’s about as evil as people can get, even if they’re human,” he said, settling further into his chair. “But no, I don’t think they’re some demonic force come to bring the end times either. They’re just… well, they’re not quite beasts, are they? Very little in common with a unicorn or a dragon. But they’re… Can I say they’re just part of the landscape? Is that blasphemous to coastal sensibilities? They’re just a species that exists.”

“A species that you hunt and kill,” Marr pointed out.

“Lots of species hunt and kill humans and are hunted and killed in turn,” Kenneth replied with a shrug. “I think everyone just gets bitter about vampires because they don’t immediately look like a threat. People feel betrayed on a personal level by the very _idea_ of vampires. They wouldn’t let a wolf into their home, but these particular wolves wear human faces. Vampires… well, in a way, they survive by taking advantage of our most precious, altruistic instincts, don’t they?”

Marr sat back, also propping up his feet and taking a sip of ale. “That’s a very philosophical way of looking at things,” he said finally, nudging Kenneth’s boot with his own.

Kenneth smirked at him over the top of his glass. “Traveling on foot through the permafrost gives a man a lot of time to think things over.”

“You travel here on _foot?_ ” Marr asked, brows climbing into the shadow of his hair.

“I stay here too long to ride a wyvern. There’s no stables in these villages that would suit them, and they’re too precious to send home without a rider. Reindeer struggle through the mountains, and I’m not a fan of dogs. It’s a couple weeks up to the Great Range, about a week to cross over them and reach the closest outpost. Wyvern cuts the rest of the trip to a day or two, depending on the storm’s temperament.”

Marr was rubbing his eyes. “And here I was thinking I’d ask you…”

“Ask what?”

“Well,” Marr said, “I was thinking of seeing Noreah for myself, after all I’ve heard of it. But three weeks on foot through the snow without any shelter? You’re a madman.”

Kenneth laughed. “You’re in good company thinking that. But if you _did_ decide to join me, I swear to do my best to keep you alive. For what it’s worth, seeing Noreah is well worth the trek.”

“They say the city is all enclosed under one roof.”

“More like…” Kenneth tried to explain, “One million roofs cover every inch of it. You can live inside your entire life and never see a single snowflake. It’s beautiful.”

“More beautiful than Moera?” Marr asked, smirking again, the tip of his boot tracing the inside curve of Kenneth’s boot. He likely didn’t realize the hide of Kenneth’s boots was too thick for him to feel the caress, but watching the movement, Kenneth could almost imagine the touch.

“I’ve been to Moera,” Kenneth said quietly, meeting Marr’s heated gaze with his own. “Also beautiful. Colorful. The lack of snow is its own charm.”

Marr hummed smugly.

“But the _stench_ ,” Kenneth continued, laughing and pulling his feet away from Marr’s and off the table. “Unbearable!” He pulled up his skirt to work on unlacing each boot, laughing harder at Marr’s offended expression. “You’ve miles of fresh air around you in each direction, open sky above you, and everything _smells_. The industry makes it impossible to _breathe_ in some districts. The whole city is almost a Poison Marsh itself.”

Marr started laughing too. “Are you telling me that Noreah _doesn’t_ stink? So many sweaty Sheriffs swaggering under its roofs, all that smoke and tanning fumes trapped under endless ceilings, and it’s somehow not noxious enough to knock you out cold?”

Kenneth grinned and raised his brows. He pulled off one boot, put it up to his nose, and inhaled deeply. Then he pulled off the other and did the same, exaggerating an expression of pure bliss. “That, my friend, is the smell of a boot that hasn’t come off in weeks,” he said, placing the boot on the table between them.

Marr looked revolted, eyeing the boot like it would jump and bite any moment. But the boot stood innocently and raised no stink. Eventually, slowly, cautiously, looking confused, Marr picked up the boot and sniffed. He looked up at Kenneth with incredulity written all over his face.

“This smells like only wool, musk, and herbs,” he hissed.

Kenneth stretched out his socked feet on the table once more with a satisfied smirk. “It’s the _kind_ of herbs that matter. But it’s also not just herbs.” He spread his hands to gesture at the inn around them. “It’s the way the the wool is processed. It’s how the buildings are constructed and the piss troughs are designed. It’s the commitment to thorough bathing. The villages here use a lot of the same good ideas, but Noreah elevates it to an artform to avoid anyone, as you said, being knocked out cold. Surely you noticed how good this place smelled when you arrived? How bad your own clothes smelled before Grett’s wife laundered and treated them for you?”

Marr sat slack-jawed, eyes glazed, thinking it over. He took off his own moccasins that the inn had given him for his stay and turned them over in his hands, sniffing here and there. Laughing nervously, he placed his feet back on the table, watching as Kenneth’s toes curled to teasingly stroke Marr’s arches. “Surely I didn’t smell _that_ bad?”

Kenneth would have resisted the urge to cackle if he wasn’t so drunk, but his glass of mead was again ending so Marr got the full brunt of it. “Let’s just say I _know_ what a Moeran trader smells like his first day here, and I’m not so sure I would have agreed to come upstairs if I’d met you then.”

“Then what _does_ Noreah smell like?” Marr asked, voice a little rough and eyes growing dark again at the reminder of what might happen later.

“Wood, mostly. And sure, there’s the _smell_ of smoke if not any black clouds of it. Some districts smell like spices and men. Others like women and perfume. Depends on the industry; depends on the local culture. Go far enough into the temple district and you’ll forget you’re in a city made of wood. All the damp stone and incense they use there hide even the smell of cedar.”

Marr again looked like he was struggling to imagine the impossible city that was Noreah.

“Won’t you be missed?” Kenneth asked. “If you go up north, won’t anyone back in Moera think you’ve died?”

Marr waved him off. “It was always a possibility. I wanted to try braving trade in the permastorm, and, if I found a way, to get across the Great Range. I’ve left my business in capable hands in the meantime. Wouldn’t it be wonderful? To trade with Noreah? That’s something my father would have been proud of.”

Kenneth smiled. Trust a trader to view travel as a means to an end.

“Well, if you think you have the fortitude for it,” he said, “You’re welcome to join me. I won’t sugar coat, Marr — it’s a hard journey. It’s deeper into the permastorm than the route you took to get here.

“It’s long, it’s cold, talking is unpleasant, the landscape starts to lose all semblance of reality, food is never cooked through, wolves are a danger, you sleep buried in snow, and you shit without taking your coat off. But! If you let the locals supply you properly, you’ll make it out the other side with all your toes and fingers still attached and have one hell of a story to tell people back in Moera.”

Marr looked properly unsettled.

Just as well. Kenneth would rather scare him off now than risk Marr losing his nerve halfway through the journey and demanding they turn back.

“I’ll have to think about it,” Marr said finally. “But you’ve already half won me over just by making it sound so frightening.” A grin grew slowly on his face and then jumped to full size.

Kenneth returned the grin, charmed by the man’s capacity for adventure and risk-taking. Perhaps he’d undersold the man.

Marr’s foot trailed along Kenneth’s shin to the hem of his dress, the big toe hooking under to tug lightly. “Is this what you would recommend wearing for such a journey?” he asked, his eyes playful once more.

“I don’t know if they make them quite so long in this village,” Kenneth replied, heart skipping, “but I’m _certain_ you arrived here not wearing nearly enough layers.”

“Oh?” Marr’s grin turned wicked. “Then maybe you’d show me all the layers I ought to invest in?”

Kenneth stood slowly, and was immediately joined by Marr, who took his hand and led him to the bed, the food and drink all forgotten. Marr sat on the bed, knees wide, positioning Kenneth less than a pace away and grinning up at him.

“So the first layer is a sweater?” Marr prompted.

“The _first_ layer is a good long coat,” Kenneth chided, kicking Marr’s foot and almost toppling over drunkenly. “The layer underneath is a wool dress. Airy and fluffy to capture a lot of heat under the coat. You’ll want slits in the sides of the skirt for the aforementioned shitting in the snow.” He demonstrated how his dress was cut up to his hips on either side to make hitching it up easy.

“You know, where I come from,” Marr said slyly, leaning back on his hands as his foot dug under Kenneth’s dress and trailed along the inside of his leg, “only women wear dresses.”

Kenneth grinned and pulled his dress over his head, tossing it on the corner of the bed. “Where _I_ come from, men want to survive the permastorm just as much as the women do.”

“That’s why you’re wearing _two_ dresses,” Marr teased, eyeing the new layer of clothing.

“It’s a tunic, you uncivilized swine,” Kenneth said while laughing, steadying his swaying against Marr’s shoulder and kicking him at the same time. “And I _know_ they wear these in Moera. _You’re_ wearing one.”

Marr laughed delightedly and tugged on the hem of Kenneth’s tunic. “Go on. I’m dying to learn what’s next.”

Kenneth struggled with the laces on his neck, the task made all the more difficult by Marr simultaneously working out the laces on his cuffs. They fumbled and cursed each other and eventually, with four hands, pulled Kenneth out of his tunic. Marr ran his hands down Kenneth’s undershirt and moaned.

“ _Please_ tell me this is woven from the manes of unicorns,” he said, groping at every inch of Kenneth’s torso and sliding the fabric over Kenneth’s hard frame. “I’ve never touched anything so soft.”

Kenneth snorted. “Just the local Norean goats. I’d like to see you hunt a unicorn for its mane. We’ll have a great big fun time at your funeral.”

“I may not be a _Sheriff_ , Ken, but I think I can hold my own against a beast.”

“Yeah, maybe a vampire if you’re good with a sword,” Kenneth said, amused by the Moeran ignorance. “Maybe even a werewolf. But a unicorn? No way. You’ll have to sit around and wait for them to die of old age like the rest of us mere mortals. Only way you’ll ever get your hands on a mane. Unless your goal is to just touch the mane, in which case it’ll probably be the last thing you’ll ever do.”

Marr paused, his hands already under Kenneth’s shirt and exploring his bare waist. “You’re serious?”

“Dead serious,” Kenneth said lowly, pressing up against Marr, and groaning as warm strong hands locked around him. “Only southerners think unicorns are harmless pretty ponies. Won’t touch you if you don’t come near, but they’ll savage you to pieces if you don’t keep your distance.”

“Next you’ll tell me that dragons are actually quite harmless.”

Kenneth laughed and shut Marr up, kissing his thin lips, hands pulling on Marr’s neck, trying to bring him closer than physically possible. Marr gave as good as he got, pulling on Kenneth’s waist urgently until they lost balance and toppled happily to the bed. Kenneth hungrily pulled at Marr’s own tunic, biting at the side of the man’s neck as his hands found their way under fabric to the dip of Marr’s spine. Marr pulled his neck away, demanded another kiss, and they rolled, racing to wrestle each other out of their pants.

Marr moaned loudly when Kenneth finally won and took Marr’s cock in hand. Kenneth rushed to shush him.

“They don’t like that sort of thing here,” he warned, realizing he himself was likely too drunk to be properly quiet. “Moan all you want if you come back to Noreah with me, but not here.”

“Understood,” Marr groaned, wrapping his own fist around Kenneth’s to get him to squeeze harder, stroke slower. “I _was_ wondering about that…”

“I imagine it’s the same on the coast? One way in the city, another in isolated villages,” Kenneth murmured against Marr’s lips as their kissing turned more tender.

Marr hummed in reply and broke off to kiss down Kenneth’s chest. He reached Kenneth’s belt, which he still hadn’t been able to to pull off even after he’d unbuckled it, and stopped, frowning at the contraption. Kenneth laughed, pulling it out of its loops and freeing his wool leg warmers, draping his ankles onto Marr’s shoulders.

“Care to do the honors?”

“Two dresses!” Marr said in a dramatic whisper as he started pulling the warmers off Kenneth’s breeches. “And now hose!”

“Shut up and strip me, Moeran.”

“How were you not boiling alive under this all night?”

Kenneth shrugged and helped Marr get his breeches off his hips. “Doesn’t bother me. After a few weeks of raw meat and vegetables, you wouldn’t mind it either. I don’t think I’ve got any fat left on me.”

“Remind me to fatten up before we leave,” Marr said, finally finishing with his task of pulling the breaches off and tossing them away into a dark corner. Seizing the quilt by a far corner, he pulled it over himself and Kenneth’s lower body as he made himself comfortable between Kenneth’s thighs.

Bemused, Kenneth stared at the covers as soft kisses fell on his hips. Then Marr’s head poked back out, hair tousled. He was grinning rakishly.

“Do you trust me?” Marr asked, one long finger running the length of Kenneth’s cock.

“Maybe?” Kenneth said, laughing but confused. “Are you going to bite anything off?”

Marr only grinned wider. “Not _off_ , but there might be a little bit of biting involved. Just a small taste here and there.”

Kenneth laughed and fell back on the bed. “Sounds awful. Just shut up and get started,” he said, shoving Marr’s head back under the quilt.

Marr took his time teasing, and Kenneth wished he were more sober so he could enjoy it fully. Lying back on the bed and closing his eyes seemed to make time skip forward every time his heart beat, and Marr was now licking his cock, now kissing it, now gently scraping his teeth against his thigh. Marr sucked so hard on the very hollow of where thigh met torso that Kenneth curled right up off the bed, gasping and thinking he was caught in an orgasm. He vaguely realized that was impossible. Still panting and shuddering, he slowly stretched back out, eyeing the shape of Marr’s head under the quilt warily as Marr licked the abused skin.

He moaned quietly and gripped the back of Marr’s head with one hand as Marr took him in his mouth and sucked. His body was both melting down into the sheets and straining up into that suction, and Kenneth could hardly remember the last time he’d felt so good, his needs all thoroughly taken care of in one evening.

Marr bit down on his other thigh and this time Kenneth had to cover his mouth with his hand to keep from flooding the room with his moans. He sat bolt upright and almost sobbed, body quivering, until Marr finally had mercy and backed off, licking the skin in apology.

Kenneth collapsed back insensate. Dizzy, drunk, tingling all over, he hummed contentedly as Marr leisurely licked his cock and then kissed his way up Kenneth’s abdomen and out from under the sheets.

Marr grinned sheepishly, his lips red from his efforts. “I think…” he said, chuckling breathlessly, “You may have had a little too much of Grett’s mead.”

Kenneth came up on his elbows to survey the problem and clicked his tongue, trying to maintain composure as his thoughts raced to find a good apology. “Ah…” he said to stall, but no further words came and he shifted uncomfortably, reaching down to see if he couldn’t get his cock a little more stiff with an expert hand.

Marr watched curiously, then crawled up over Kenneth’s body. “You seemed to enjoy things _quite a bit_ regardless,” he said, his face a comical mask of innocence. Kenneth made to kiss him, but missed, or Marr turned his head, and he kissed the man’s flawlessly smooth cheek instead.

“You are incredibly good,” Kenneth admitted. “Twice I thought I _was_ coming. Guess I’m so drunk I didn’t realize your mouth was in the wrong place.”

Marr laughed and leaned into Kenneth’s neck, nuzzling and licking. “Aren’t you glad you trusted my biting expertise?”

Kenneth grunted agreement as he was unexpectedly pulled to straddle Marr, the world spinning around him. “Oh,” he said, placing a hand to his temple. “I _really_ overdid it with the mead. A dozen apologies. Can be so hard to gauge where my tolerance is after a long trip.”

Marr hummed, his hand on his own dick, which was fully hard and heavily weeping. “It’s all the same to me. I’m just enjoying seeing you naked.” Kenneth grinned, but he was staring at Marr’s precome, which looked to be tinged with pink. He blinked, but the illusion didn’t disappear. A trick of the candlelight?

“Kenneth?”

Kenneth shook off his confusion and bent down to kiss Marr, his own hand joining Marr’s in slowly stroking his dick between them. But Marr dodged the kiss once more, murmuring, “Not now,” and kissed Kenneth’s throat instead.

More confused than ever, and starting to wilt into a bad, lonely sort of drunkenness from the euphoria he’d had most of the evening, Kenneth licked his lips and asked, “Anything else I can do for you, in addition to being naked?”

Marr’s other hand slipped around to take a handful of Kenneth’s muscular rear, squeezing and pulling their hips together. Kenneth moaned and arched into Marr’s assault on his neck and chest.

“Well,” Marr said quietly against Kenneth’s skin, “I don’t suppose you think we can get away with a bit of buggery in this unenlightened and suspicious little village?”

Kenneth shivered. “I’m drunk enough to try.”

Marr’s hand strayed to the split of Kenneth’s backside, but Kenneth pulled away, laughing.

“Moeran savage,” he chided, climbing off the bed, “give me a minute to freshen up.” He glanced down at Marr’s cock. “I’d tell you to grab your oil while I’m gone, but you hardly seem to need any.” And, feeling cheeky, he kissed the glistening underside before walking away to the wash basins.

Head spinning worse than ever and legs wobbly, he licked his lips as he leaned against the wall and gave himself a good lather and rinse, drying with the toilet towel. He tasted blood and wondered why. Marr was watching him from the bed, propped up on one elbow.

“You Noreans take your hygiene more seriously than I’d imagined,” Marr called across the room, one hand still idly stroking himself. “Most Moeran boys are happy to hop on without a second thought.”

“Well, there’s your problem,” Kenneth said, now washing his hands in another basin. Drying with the hand towel, he dipped two fingers into a small bowl of oil meant for keeping the skin healthy against the cold, but well suited to other purposes. He walked back, struggling to keep to a straight path, and continued, “You’ve mistaken a Norean _man_ for a Moeran _boy_.”

He straddled Marr’s hips once more, reaching back to rub some of the oil onto his hole and then slathering the rest onto Marr’s heavy cock.

Marr smirked up at him. “Is it common for Norean men to be so proud of their masculinity while sinking onto another man’s cock?”

Kenneth paused, Marr’s cock in hand, hips raised to align with it, staring at Marr curiously. Then he smirked back, towering over his bed partner smugly. “I _know_ how it is in Moera, Marr. The endless gender politics. The struggle to prove yourself worthy of higher status and greater masculinity than your neighbor. It’s as backwards and unenlightened as some of the suspicions and petty judgements of this village.”

He lowered his hips, and with a smooth exhale, relaxed and took the head inside himself, his inner muscles immediately aflutter at the tickly intrusion.

“In Noreah,” he continued, sinking further in small pulses, “We are who we are. The weak don’t survive without the strong to look out for them and protect them until they can themselves become strong. There’s no room for jealousy, no room for tearing each other down. If you make it through the permastorm, you’ll understand how stupid it is to question the masculinity of a born and raised Norean for what he chooses to do when he’s indoors and in the comfort of his bedroom.”

He sank the rest of the way and sighed happily, his hole stinging some. He’d been a little reckless and impatient. Still, the full feeling was nice and he couldn’t complain.

Marr was looking up at him with wide eyes, hands locked in an iron grip on Kenneth’s hips. “I stand thoroughly chastised,” he breathed, and Kenneth grinned.

“Good,” Kenneth purred. “Now how about standing thoroughly hellbent on coming deep inside me?”

Marr groaned and rolled his hips up. “I’d like that.”

They moved slowly at first, getting a feel for each other’s rhythm and range of motion, the motions growing easier as Kenneth’s body adjusted and was more deeply imbued with the oil. Kenneth sighed happily, still wishing he hadn’t gotten so drunk but able to latch on to individual moments of pleasure as time continued to skip forward in messy intervals.

Carefully, Marr pulled him off and rolled over on top, kissing Kenneth’s chest and aligning himself between Kenneth’s splayed thighs. Kenneth shivered as Marr now set the pace, winding up to a faster tempo as he bent Kenneth tighter in half, knees close to kissing his ears.

Kenneth sighed once more. Getting fucked was always more pleasurable when you could surrender your whole mind to enjoying it, rather than having to carry on the task of riding.

“You, ah, always prefer to take so much initiative?” he asked, watching Marr’s blissed face, taken by how handsome he was in the shadows, his sickly complexion hidden without direct light.

Marr grinned, all sharp teeth, and panted, “Boy or man, everyone looks happier when they don’t have to put effort into getting fucked.”

Kenneth laughed hard. “I was thinking along those same lines!” he said, wiping an eye as it got misty. “But then when you’re doing the fucking —”

“—feels better to be in control of it,” Marr finished.

“I think it’s a matter of,” Kenneth broke off to moan, “ah, goals and timing. If you’re getting fucked, it doesn’t matter if it lasts forever. But the other way around, if someone makes you wait forever, you want to _kill_ them for it.”

Marr was laughing now too and had to stop and pull out as he chortled into Kenneth’s chest. Finally, with a snort, he lifted his head and pointed a stern finger at Kenneth’s face. “Now you stop that, or I’ll have to go ahead and do just that.”

Kenneth raised his hands, face all innocence. Still chuckling and grumbling death threats, Marr pushed back in, raising the pace to a frantic one. Feeling devilish and hungry to see Marr fall apart, Kenneth put more effort into it, squeezing around Marr as best he could at the speed that Marr was setting. Marr grunted, slowing and making his thrusts more punishing in playful retaliation.

Finally, Marr’s body seized and he groaned, burying his face in Kenneth’s upturned thigh as he rode his pleasure out with twitching hips.

Kenneth stretched up to kiss the top of his head, surprised by how dry and fresh the man’s hair was, rather than being covered in a healthy layer of oils. He inhaled deeply as he stroked Marr’s cheeks and ears with his thumbs, but Marr had almost no scent. Confused, he sniffed around until Marr recovered and started laughing.

“Do I smell so foreign?” he asked, pulling away from Kenneth’s grip and out of his body.

Kenneth frowned up at him as he lowered his legs to the bed. “No, you just use a lot more soap in your hair than anyone I’ve ever met.”

Marr hummed thoughtfully, hands stroking down Kenneth’s legs. Then he rolled Kenneth over. “I want to watch you push it out.”

“And get it all over the bed?” Kenneth asked, looking over his shoulder.

Marr shrugged. “One of life’s most simple pleasures. Worth a bit of mess.”

Kenneth shook his head, chuckling, and reached back to pull one muscular asscheek outwards, pushing until he felt something hot bubble up, trail down, and get trapped in his hair. Marr groaned appreciatively.

“I’ll go get you a rag,” he said, and slipped off the bed unsteadily.

“Do you have a robe in here?” Kenneth asked, also climbing off the bed, trying to keep Marr’s come from dripping off and making a bigger mess than the damp spots they’d already left here and there.

Marr pointed to one as he came up and kissed Kenneth’s neck, reaching around to wipe at the mess thoroughly. Then he made Kenneth turn and gave the task more direct attention.

“It’s alright,” Kenneth said, stepping away, “I’ll do the rest. Gotta go downstairs and piss and all the rest anyway.” He pulled on the house robe and tied it loosely around himself. “If you’ll give me the rag, yeah, thanks, I’ll be back soon.”

And kissing Marr lightly on the mouth, Kenneth stumbled to the door.

Oddly, when he licked his lips in the hallway, they tasted like blood again.

✘✘✘✘✘✘✘

Marr sank to the bed.

He sat staring into space, stone cold sober, unable to believe his luck.

A whole night of close proximity and Kenneth seemed none the wiser. He’d _bitten_ the man, _twice_ , and gotten away with it.

He shivered, imagining having to fight off the Sheriff if things had gone sideways. Rather than being emaciated after his long journey through the permastorm with little food, Kenneth looked all the more imposing naked, his thick muscle all on proud, clearly-defined display.

Marr rubbed his temples and finally stood to clear the food and drink away, gagging slightly as the smell reminded him how much of it he had made himself consume earlier. Covering what he could, he set it all out into the cold hallway for the night, then picked up and neatly folded his and Kenneth’s clothing. As he worked, he took stock of everything he had learned and everything he had to resolve to do from here on out.

Foremost, Kenneth’s theories had been a shock to the system, and now that he had time to mull them over, he realized with great surprise that Kenneth likely had some experience practicing magic, even if the man had carefully avoided admitting as much. Certainly something to pry into.

Secondly, it was a great relief to hear from both Grett and Kenneth that a Moeran-Norean alliance against the vampire city was unlikely. Knowing that, he could very safely travel home and not waste any more time in this frozen wasteland. However, he still had no idea exactly how accurate this assessment would be if the situation changed in any way. Say, if Kenneth was ever killed by a stray vampire. In fact, Marr thought, his stomach clenching, the two humans had made it sound like Noreah’s decision-making on turning out in force was very much a dangerously unstable process.

Lastly, he thought in frustration, he _was_ very interested in traveling up to Noreah for too many reasons to list. Beyond intelligence gathering, he wanted to learn more of Kenneth’s theories. If the hunter was a magic practitioner, could he be guided to discover how to cure vampirism — perhaps even cleanse the Poison Marshes? And if Marr wanted to see the city for himself just for the hell of it, was that so wrong? His mission was to ensure that the Noreans would stay out of the coming conflict, and what better way to do so than from the heart of Noreah, provided he wasn’t discovered and dismembered by the city’s Sheriffs?

Marr sat down hard in an armchair, still naked.

How lucky was he, he thought again, that Kenneth hadn’t noticed anything off? His decision to feed only on animals since traveling into the permastorm had been a purposeful one, but his being in these parts for weeks before meeting Kenneth was pure circumstance. No one back in Dannal knew about people like Kenneth being able to sense their presence. Had all the poison really aired out from him and made him hard to detect?

Still, even without the poison, he was bound to run into difficulty hiding his nature if he traveled to Noreah with Kenneth.

Groaning, he stood to give himself a light scrubbing at the basins.

What a decision to make. Hopefully, he had some time to make it. Kenneth had only just arrived in the village, and even without any recent vampire attacks would likely hang around for a while. How well would Marr be able to hide his nature during that time? Perhaps he’d make his decision based on how many close calls he’d have before Kenneth left to travel home.

The door opened, and Kenneth squeezed in, cringing and quickly shutting out the cold.

“Thanks for taking care of the food,” he said, disrobing and moving to the fireplace, his skin rosy and damp from a hot bath.

“Of course,” Marr said with a smile, rinsing his hands and moving to stand next to him, one elbow on the mantle, his other hand roving freely over Kenneth’s now perfectly clean backside.

Kenneth smiled faintly, warming his hands over the fire, staring deep into the heart of it. “Time for some sleep? Though I’m not sure how I’ll ever drift off, my head is spinning so much.”

Marr hummed. He’d probably had too much of Kenneth’s blood, even if the human was drunk enough to excuse away the dizziness. It had been too tempting after so many long weeks of animal blood, thought it was the thrilling call of danger and daring that had tipped the scales. Still, he’d have to develop a good system for staying well-fed without alerting Kenneth to the presence of a vampire. He took Kenneth’s hand and pulled.

“Come try anyway,” he murmured, kissing Kenneth’s ear.

Continuing to ingratiate himself to the Sheriff was his best bet if he intended to travel further north. It was amazing how much humans excused and ignored once they trusted and cared for someone.

Not that it was such a hardship to kiss and touch such a well-shaped man.

Kenneth followed obediently, swaying into him with every other step.

As they sank into the large bed, Marr grasped the end of one of Kenneth’s hair ribbons. Kenneth, surprised, turned his head to look, and the small bow deflated, its ends dangling. Marr grinned.

“Let me see your hair down.”

Kenneth sighed, rolling his eyes but smiling. “Fine,” he said, reaching for his second braid. “You do that one.”

Marr crossed his legs and worked on unwrapping the ribbon the rest of the way and loosening the tightly braided locks. Kenneth’s hair, pale blonde and lustrous like everyone else’s in the region, left behind small traces of grease on his fingertips as he worked on it, though it didn’t stink like Moeran hair, carrying only Kenneth’s natural scent. The dry ends were bent all out of shape by the long-term hairstyle, but came apart into softer waves as he approached the roots. All done, Marr sat back, startled by how much gentler and more youthful the man looked with the pale waves softening the appearance of his strong jaw. Oblivious, Kenneth shook his hair out and reached to dig in the drawer of the bed stand for a brush.

“Since we did all that, might as well do it right,” Kenneth mumbled, pulling the brush through his hair slowly from root to tip. His hair straightened with every stroke. “It’s been a while since I brushed the oils through properly and I think the ends are starting to — what?”

Kenneth had noticed Marr staring.

“You’re very beautiful,” Marr said, though he thought privately to himself that he’d liked Kenneth best with his hair loose and wildly wavy, untamed by brushing.

Kenneth perked up, grinning bashfully. He didn’t say anything, and continued taking care of his hair looking like he was trying to stop smiling but couldn’t. When he was done and the ends were shining healthily, he shook his hair again, putting some volume back into it and setting the brush aside.

No, Marr thought, I like his hair best like _that_ , and reached forward to tousle it some more. “You should have it loose next time.”

“Next time what?”

“Next time I bugger you. I want to see what it looks like when it’s a mess.”

Kenneth laughed as they settled to lie down again. “So if I keep it braided, I’ll get to tumble _you_ next time?”

Marr pulled Kenneth’s head onto his own chest, enjoying the feeling of the human’s warm breath on his bare skin. Every time Kenneth smiled, he felt his chance of success grow. He could _do_ this. He could travel all the way to Noreah with this man, and Kenneth would be too disarmed by their mutual affection to suspect a single thing.

“If you keep it _unbraided_ , you’ll get to do whatever you want.”

**Author's Note:**

> You can find more ficlets, imagines, sketches, and paintings on my pillowfort, [razielim](https://www.pillowfort.io/razielim), where I've currently set up residence. Adults only.
> 
> You can also [download all of Smutmas as a PDF](https://drive.google.com/file/d/1oh9x41sqzm-WUpeUA9g942ioQpmd1n77/view?usp=sharing) this year! :D


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